


Alone

by sadboi_syd



Category: Twenty One Pilots
Genre: M/M, Mermaid!Josh, Sad lonely bab!Tyler, This is trash don't look at me, mermaid!au
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-03-02
Updated: 2016-03-02
Packaged: 2018-05-24 06:43:26
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,599
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6144964
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sadboi_syd/pseuds/sadboi_syd
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The prompt was to write a fluffy mermaid!AU where Tyler was smol and lonely and Josh showed up to keep him company</p>
            </blockquote>





	Alone

_ From childhood's hour I have not been _

_ As others were; I have not seen _

_ As others saw; I could not bring _

_ My passions from a common spring. _

 

Tyler gazed out over the ocean, watching the silver waves dash forward and retreat in perpetual motion. The sea breeze wrapped around his shirtless body while the rising sun, early in his ritual, warmed the slender man’s skin with the day’s first rays of golden light. Arms full of musty books, Tyler shuffled through the hills of sand and onto a decrepit dock, the end of which he sat down upon, dangling his toes towards the ocean’s surface. He cracked open an anthology from his pile, and began to read aloud, his voice singing out against the tide into the lonely morning air. 

Tyler was content to be alone, he told himself constantly. It was partially the reason why he bought this isolated property, nestled between craggy cliffs and sand dunes, cut off from the chaos of the world. Occasionally he would have company, or a stray hiker would come along, but those occurrences were few and far between and often Tyler found himself submerged in a world of poetry and the melodic tune of nature, of the crying gulls and whispering breeze and the thundering percussion of the ocean. And thus he sat, on coarse, briny wood weathered by decades of torment, screaming out against the silence with harsh spoken words and soft murmurs, unconsciously pleading for his loneliness to end. 

Little did he know, he was not alone. About forty or fifty feet out on the water, there was a figure, shadowed by the rising sun with features indistinguishable. Their head was cocked to the side, as if they were listening intently. The two stayed like this for hours, Tyler obliviously reading aloud and the other person absorbing the sad man’s words. When Tyler got up to return to his cabin, the figure submerged, disappearing without even a ripple on the water. This pattern repeated day after day, for weeks. The stranger was captivated, enthralled by Tyler’s tanned muscles and soft pink lips. They felt the pain in Tyler’s words, the loneliness, the fear. And worst of all, they wanted to do what was forbidden of them, kiss Tyler and tell him that it would all get better. 

Three weeks and four days passed before Tyler noticed the stranger. He was turning a page when he dropped his pen onto the dock and into the blue-green waters. It was when he reached down in vain and watched the pen sink down out of reach that he locked eyes with them, well, him. A mop of curly red hair, wet against his forehead, and hazel eyes that were filled with a mixture of fear and astonishment greeted Tyler from only ten feet away. The man was about to disappear once more when he heard a feather light voice call out against the current.

“Hello? Who are you?” 

“I- uh,” the man stammered, blushing profusely. “I’m Josh? I’m sorry I have to go right now,” he rushed with clear panic in his voice, making a move to submerge himself in the watery depths.

“Wait, no, don’t go!” Something in Tyler’s voice made Josh stop and turn around, perhaps it was the desperation, the coarse tone of depression, the sound of someone who has been alone for far too long. Whatever it was, Josh went against every rule he had ever been told to follow and met Tyler’s pleading glance. A flicker of relief crossed the man’s eyes and he grinned, one of those grins that extrudes through the entire body. “Hey, Josh, I’m Tyler. What brings you to this part of the beach?”

“Oh, I- uh, I was just going for a morning swim and I heard you reading poems. I- um, I like your tattoos,” Josh mumbled, hoping his lie would be good enough. 

“Oh. You know there’s no swimming allowed down this whole stretch of ocean, right? At least, not where there’s national park, which is literally everywhere except this property,” Tyler explained, looking down at Josh from his perch on the decaying dock. Josh seized up, realizing the mistake he had made. 

“And, thanks. My mom was pretty pissed when I first got it.” 

“Shit, I didn’t know that. Uh, it was nice talking to you Tyler, but I gotta go.”

“I can drive you back to where you were, you know. I don’t mind, and you won’t get caught by the coast guard,” Tyler offered, a hint of confusion lacing his voice. 

“No, I’d rather swim, thank you though. Bye!” With that Josh submerged himself in the lukewarm water, leaving nothing but a tiny ripple where his head was. 

“What the fuck.”

 

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

 

It took exactly six days for Josh to return. This time, however, Tyler was waiting for him, as if Josh were a guest who came two hours late to a party. His face lit up as Josh surfaced, a sunbeam piercing through a stormcloud. “I didn’t think you were going to come back!” he laughed, ignoring the fact that Josh clearly came up out of nowhere.

“How could I not? Where else do I get to hear poetry?” Josh quipped back, surprising himself with how forward he was being. “Anyway, um, how else was I supposed to return this to you?” Josh shyly held out the pen Tyler had dropped, pretending not to notice Tyler’s eyes glancing at his long, muscular, tattooed arm as he did. Tyler giggled, a sound that could cure even the most deadly of diseases, in Josh’s opinion. 

“Uh, thanks! You really didn’t have to do that, I have a ton back at home. And I dunno, coffee shops have poetry nights sometimes,” Tyler responded, plucking the pen out of Josh’s outstretched hand. He noticed something that struck him as odd; Josh had pale green scales on his hand. Not many, but a few here and there, dotting his milky skin like freckles. Tyler added this to the growing mental list of “Josh: What The Fuck” that he had going in his head. Josh’s eyes were laced with confusion at ‘coffee shops’.

“Coffeeshops?”

“You, you have been to a coffee shop before, right?” 

“Oh yeah, totally! Coffee is great, I love coffee, I eat it all the time, it’s my favorite!” came the completely oblivious response. 

“Right.” Another addition to the list. “So, I take it you’re a professional swimmer or something? No one swims that much for fun.”

“No, I don’t have a job or anything, exactly.” Josh internally cringed, terrified that Tyler was catching onto his secret (he totally was). He reached behind him to scratch the back of his neck. 

“Neither do I, I get that. I kinda just lay around here all day every day. Yo, do you want to sit up here with me? It’s probably a lot more relaxing than treading water,” Tyler offered, testing Josh. He had done a lot of thinking over the week of Josh’s absence, and of course everybody around had heard the local legends. Tyler may have even gone into town and asked around. Noticing Josh’s scales and his total oblivion towards human culture had put the icing on the cake. Now, he was testing his theory. 

Terrified hazel eyes looked back up at Tyler. He knew. He had to know. “Um, no thanks, I actually should be going, I have a lot of stuff to be doing back at home and I-” Josh rambled, slowly swimming backwards, away from the dock and away from Tyler. 

“Josh!” Tyler called exasperatedly, but the red haired man kept backing away, until he was about twenty feet out. “Listen, Josh, I know what you are, and I don’t mind!”

Josh’s entire body froze. Tremors ran throughout his arms and hands and his heart began to pound. He felt Tyler’s eyes boring into his. “I- I d-don’t know what you-you’re talking about Tyler,” he stammered, backing away even more. Tyler sighed, before standing up and diving into the grey ocean with a great splash. Josh found himself unable to move as Tyler approached him. 

“Josh,” the now soaked man panted as he came to a stop, not even two feet away from Josh. “You’re a merman. That’s why you have the stamina to swim all day and you can just go underwater for insane amounts of time and that’s why you don’t know what coffee is,” Tyler trailed off, reaching out to grab Josh’s arm.

“Th-that’s ridiculous…” Josh tried to shake Tyler off of him, but to no avail. In his struggle his tail began to thrash, and he winced as he felt it collide with flesh. 

“You literally just hit me with your tail, dude.”

“Pleasedonthurtme!” Josh pleaded, tugging at Tyler’s hand fruitlessly. “Oh my Neptune please don’t please let go please let me go!” At this, Tyler grabbed Josh’s other arm and began to whisper soothingly.

“Shhh, calm down, Josh, it’s okay. I’m not going to hurt you. I’m not going to do anything to you. Shh, it’s all okay, you’re safe, nothing is going to happen to you…” Tyler murmured gently, until Josh stopped struggling and looked at him with empty, distraught eyes. 

“Do you promise?” His voice was shaky and low and Tyler had never seen someone look so scared in his life. 

“I promise, Josh. I’m not going to hurt you. I just want to hang out with you, get to know you better.”

“You-you’re sure?” Josh wanted to trust Tyler, he really did, but everything he’d ever seen or heard about humans told him not to, to swim far away, to never come back. He never should have come in the first place, what was he doing? What was he thinking? What was wrong with hi-

“Yes. I’m sure. I’m lonely, Josh, I’m a lonely man. I needed a friend, and then you came along all adorable and shy and I just, I’m not going to hurt you. I’m not going to do anything that can hurt you, okay?” Tyler let go of Josh, using his arms to help keep him afloat. 

“Okay. Um, how exactly do you plan on us ‘hanging out’?” Josh asked, still wary. 

“Uh, fuck. Hmm, well, I do have a bathtub…”

“What’s a bathtub?” 

“It’s a thing that you fill with water and sit in.” Josh decided that humans were fucking strange. “I could bring you into my bathroom and we can drink coffee and I can read you poems and stuff, it’ll be sick as frick!” Tyler rambled. Josh smiled inwardly at how cute Tyler was being. 

“Umm, okay? I guess? You’re sure you’re not going to do anything to me?” Josh responded, flicking a strand of hair out of his eye.

“Yeah, dude, I swear on my life, nothing bad is going to happen.” Tyler gave Josh a reassuring pat on his shoulder, feeling the cool wetness of the ocean underneath his fingertips. “Let’s swim to shore, we went pretty far out.” Indeed the pair had gone far out, the beach about seventy feet away. Waves were swelling, slate colored stallions crashing towards the land. The looming sky was darkening with clouds, threatening a storm at any time. The boys started swimming back to the rocky sand, letting the choppy tides carry them forward. Once they were close enough to the beach, Tyler stood up, dripping wet with his shorts threatening to fall down, as they were completely saturated from his unexpected swim. He placed his hands on his hips and looked down at Josh, biting his lip in concentrative thought. 

“How are you going to get me up that hill?” Josh asked nervously, images of being dragged through the rocky sand flashing behind his eyes.

“I’m gonna carry you, silly!” 

“Your gangly ass arms could carry maybe three oranges, tops, dude.” Tyler gasped, placing his hand on his chest in mock pain and despondency. 

“I think you’ll soon realize that you are very very wrong, my friend.” Tyler leaned forward and scooped Josh up with ease, the latter’s shimmery dark turquoise tail flopping over one arm, in an awkward bridal position. Josh hugged Tyler’s midsection for dear life, but there was no need, as Tyler strode up the path confidently and without any difficulty. They stayed silent for a few minutes as Tyler walked, and Josh looked at his legs with awe. 

“How do you do that?” he whispered, eyes the size of the moon. “I want to be able to do that.” 

“Hm?” Tyler asked from above. “Do what?” He groaned slightly and shifted Josh’s weight in his arms.

“Walk.” This jarred Tyler, and he nearly stopped walking himself, as if it were unfair to Josh to do what he could not. 

“Maybe there is a way,” Tyler murmured gently, thinking back to the legends the old fishermen in town would always tell drunkenly, huddled around the pool table of the local tavern. 

“What was that?” Josh swivelled his head back up to face Tyler, confusion written across his features. 

“Nothing, I was just thinking out loud. Hey, do you think you can get the door for me?” Tyler nodded towards the worn out door handle. “It’s unlocked.” Josh nodded and unwrapped an arm from Tyler’s body, carefully reaching out as if the cool metal would hurt him. He twisted the knob, pushed the door open, and retracted his arm faster than Tyler’s eyes could even register. “Thanks, man.” Josh merely nodded against Tyler’s damp chest. 

“S’no problem,” he muttered. Josh was starting to feel quite uncomfortable. He was smooshed against a handsome man’s chest while being carried into a human house where he physically could not escape. Every tale he had ever heard about humans being murderers was rushing towards his closed eyes, images zooming radially and chilling him to the bone. 

“Josh, are you okay? You look really pale…” 

“I-I’m just being paranoid, I think. Don’t worry about it.” Tyler frowned at this, knowing that Josh was scared out of his mind at the moment. He could feel it in the tightness of the merman’s grip and the crazed look of a cornered animal in his eye. 

“We don’t have to do this, I can sit on the dock and chill,” Tyler offered. Josh waved him off, and gave Tyler a grin. 

“Nah, I want to. I’ve never seen a human’s bathroom before.” Before Tyler could stop himself, he snorted. 

“It’s nothing spectacular, man.” But Josh didn’t care. As soon as the pair had entered Tyler’s large cabin, his fear faded ever so slightly and was replaced with undiluted awe. He was where no other merman had ever been before. He was seeing things that no one he knew had ever seen. He reached out to caress the smooth, waxy corner of a side table, and he felt his fingers brush against the soft fabric of the couch. The door to the bathroom was ajar, and Tyler nudged it open with his foot. “This is it, the bathroom.” 

Josh looked around. There was a small basin with metal pipes connected to it, a strange unidentifiable object, and a mirror above the small basin. The majority of the space in the bathroom was taken up by a large basin, which he assumed was the bathtub, as he was gently being lowered and placed into it. Tyler turned a dial, and water began to pour out of a small pipe in a steady stream. It was hot, but not scalding, the perfect temperature to relax in. Josh sighed in contentment as it poured out onto his tail, soaking the previously drying scales. Tyler chuckled at Josh’s look of bliss, before sitting down on the object (later known as a toilet) and looking at the young merman with a loose grin. 

“This is amazing! How do you make the water come out like that? And how can you control the temperature? And-” Josh continued to ramble about the wonders of the bathroom before Tyler stopped him with a question that made him grin. 

“Do you want some coffee?”

 

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

 

The water was long past lukewarm and Josh was in the middle of recounting one of his many tales of the grey depths of the Atlantic Ocean when he trailed off mid-sentence; Tyler was staring at him. “I-is everything okay did I do something wrong are you mad at me oh my gosh-” Tyler blinked in surprise, blushing and lifting his hands in a motion to calm down. This only caused the merman to recoil, and Tyler instantly felt a rush of guilt.

“No no no! You didn’t do anything wrong! I’m not mad at you, don’t worry. Everything is okay, Josh, I promise.”

“I just- you were looking at me and I got scared and ugh, I’m sorry, I overreacted.”

“Dude. Stop apologizing. Honestly, I was looking at you because I was fascinated by your lips when you talk. I know, it sounds really creepy and strange and pretty damn homo but they’re so, they’re so beautiful, with the dusty pink mixed with an ashy rose with aqua creeping in along the edges, and…” Tyler trailed off, his voice morphing into a hoarse whisper. “They’re very kissable lips.” Josh stared at Tyler wide eyed, mouth hanging open. He fidgeted with his hands for a second, and then looked down. And then, in the quietest of voices, 

“I want to go back to the ocean now, if that’s okay.” His words echoed around the silent bathroom, interrupted only by the rhythmic dripping of the faucet, each water droplet pounding into Tyler’s head, screaming at him that he had messed up. 

“Frick. I’m, I’m sorry Josh I shouldn’t have said that, oh my god. I’m so sorry please forgive me I really didn’t mean what I said,”

“But you did mean what you said, that’s why you said it. Please, take me home now.” Josh’s voice sounded hollow and confused, but Tyler wearily stood up to oblige, scattering poetry and old leather bound books that he had been reading aloud across the tiled floor. He stood over the bathtub with his hands on his hips, looking down at the merman. 

“So, uh, you probably don’t want to be anywhere near me right now and I completely get that, but it’s gonna be a bit awkward getting you out of the tub and back down to the ocean. Bear with me, I guess. And again, I’m really, really sorry, man.” Tyler mumbled dejectedly, his internal monologue berating him for announcing his feelings so blatantly to the timid man before him. 

“Ty-”

“No, I get it. I fucked up.”

“Tyler.”

“We just have to get you out of here and then you don’t ever have to come back, if you don’t want to.”

“Tyler!” Josh snapped, voice rising far above its normal tone. “Listen to me.” The brunette paused his ramblings, staring wide eyed at Josh. “For as long as I can remember, I was told not to trust the surface. That humans were evil. That if I ever was seen I’d get poked and prodded and needled and locked up for the rest of my life as an exhibit. And then, one day, I went to the surface and I saw this beautiful, beautiful man, sitting on a dock reading poetry to the world around him. It broke my heart, because I could tell how sad and lonely he was. I could see how each word clung to his lips in a desperate call for someone to come and keep him company. But I was scared. 

“I kept coming back, every morning, at the same time. Without fail, he was there, voice singing out against the crashing waves and screaming gulls. And one day, after a few weeks, he saw me. When we locked eyes I swear my heart stopped, both out of fear and out of complete and total astonishment. How could the surface, a place so inherently cruel and forbidding, have someone so  _ fucking _ gorgeous, someone who rips the breath out of your gills and your lungs? How could any danger lie in someone who looked so pure? And then he spoke, he told me not to leave. Something about him, the way his voice cracked, the way his eyes flashed with desperation to talk to someone real- I couldn’t leave. The man needed me. So I stayed. I put my trust in him, despite everything I was ever told about humanity. 

“Tyler, he was you. You showed me that they were wrong about the surface. There is beauty. And fuck, even if the only beautiful thing is you, and the rest is total shit, I’d come back because there’s something intoxicating about you, man. I don’t know what it is. And I freaked out just then because I realized something that would probably get me exiled back home.”

“What- what did you realize?” Tyler asked, his voice hoarse. He was kneeling on the cool beige tile now, entranced by his companion’s story. He wasn’t expecting strong, wet arms to reach out and pull his face in. His mouth collided with Josh’s and he let out a slight noise of surprise, before sinking into the kiss. Their lips fit together almost perfectly, Tyler noticed, and Josh tasted like salt water and seaweed, but also like the reflection of the moon on the rippling ocean at night, like serenity and freedom. Tyler pulled away reluctantly, feeling Josh’s arms heavy on his neck. 

“I realized that I kind of really wanted to kiss you too.” 


End file.
